


Maternal Instincts

by fydyan



Category: Stargate Atlantis, The Sentinel
Genre: Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-07
Updated: 2012-09-07
Packaged: 2017-11-13 17:25:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/505937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fydyan/pseuds/fydyan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>None of the ascended had ever considered the repercussions of going back to visit – especially not the possibility of pregnancy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Maternal Instincts

She missed laughter, she missed children, she missed _touch._ So every so often she would take human form and live among them. It didn't happen all that frequently, once every two hundred years or so, but it was long enough to see how they were growing. She thrilled with every bit of progress, every triumph of peace, every tiny step toward ascension, and she despaired at the far greater prevalence of violence, at the way that every step forward seemed to be accompanied by ten thousand steps back. She set down for a half-dozen years at most, lived with them, loved with them, cried with them, and it was enough to get her by. She returned to her brethren, and knew they thought her strange, but knew also that what she learned was shared by all.

There was no one like her, and so none of them had ever imagined possible repercussions. She was caught up in a time of love and war, and never considered the possibility of _pregnancy,_ not after eons bodiless. And she never considered that pregnancy would tie her to her human form, and then to the human plane. But after holding him tight to her chest, red and screaming and hairy even then, she could never let another have him. Her brethren were in attendance at the birth; she could feel their love, and their badly-hidden joy. It had been so long since children were among them. They came to visit often, as he grew and flourished among the different tribes of this world. He grew up with more love and more peace than any baby in millennia, and one day she would tell him the truth, and one day he would join them. 

She loved him with all of the fervor she once dedicated to their great battles, with all of the attention she fed into the final meditation that removed her from the corporeal plane. And yet, when her little one kissed her goodbye on the steps of his college dorm, she couldn't help feel the relief of his release. He would need her, he would always need her, but now she could _soar,_ if just for a while. There was no one like her, so none of them had known what a drain it would be, to resume the body for decades. She had probably handled it better than any of them, but her retreat into energy was sheer necessity. As the years passed, she spent more time away from earth than she did on it, but she was still his mother, and tried to be there. It took more out of her than it ever had, to take form and visit, but she came as often as she could.

It was not often enough, it turned out. Not to keep him from the violence, not to keep him from the partnership with a man who was desperate for his help. It was the curse of their race, this need to be needed, this need to _help._ They let it go to ascend, or at least, they told themselves they did. But her baby had inherited it, and would not, could not, let his desperately gifted partner down. It made her stomach churn to see him holding a gun as if he could actually use it – but he was up against his own kind of monsters, and she had once sat in the chair and felt the drones fly. That too made her stomach churn, and she was glad to return to a state where she didn't have one. 

When she spent long enough without form, she could see the flow, see the patterns. She couldn't quite see the future, not the way others did, but it was close, close enough and true enough. And she plucked a thread, and saw Blair renowned for his work, famous and valued and clever enough to get noticed by Oma's favorites. She saw him sitting in the chair – no, not _the_ chair, but another, close enough – and saw him refusing to go anywhere without his partner. Then the two of them were going, going _home,_ and maybe it was his birthright but she was back in the body almost without thought. She was in Cascade, she was in their home, her hand hovered over the keyboard and she followed the thread, saw Blair with a shield and a gun and her heart was breaking even as she hit send.

Even as she prepared the lies, she knew there was a good chance that he wouldn't believe them. He would hate her, for a while. Hopefully not forever. But even if he did, it was worth it. Because the Wraith were never getting her baby.


End file.
